About the Speaker: Yasemin Kalender is an Assistant Director, Science Pedagogy, working mostly with students and faculty to support Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) teaching and learning. She provides mentoring for Teaching Fellows at Harvard, offers one-on-one consultation with both faculty and graduate students, and conducts various workshops in STEM pedagogy (e.g., use of active learning methods). Yasemin received her M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Physics & Astronomy from the University of Pittsburgh and her B.S. degree in Physics & Astronomy from Bogazici University. Before joining the Bok Center, she was an Active Learning Initiative Postdoctoral Researcher at Cornell University. She helped oversee newly reformed inquiry-based laboratory courses in physics and trained graduate students in teaching these reformed labs.

 

Description: In recent decades, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) education has been enhancing their teaching methods to engage students in a more meaningful way in their learning processes. Instead of content-delivery with a teacher-centred classroom, STEM educators have shifted the focus of their instruction more towards learner-centred methods. Active Learning (AL) has been a crucial part of this reformation and shown to improve students’ learning across different science disciplines (Freeman et al, 2014). Using AL in a science classroom is not only beneficial for students but also helpful for instructors to revise their course goals and receive immediate feedback on students’ learning progress. In this interactive workshop, we will discuss various aspects of AL methods, their benefits and challenges (and how we can overcome them), and the importance of creating a welcoming learning culture to implement AL methods in an equitable way.

When: December 2 at 04:00 PM

Where: Zoom